Applications open for the 2024-25 Sporting Club Grants Program

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Image credit: Football Victoria website

Football Victoria is excited to share that Sport and Recreation Victoria’s 2024-25 Sporting Club Grants Program has officially opened, providing crucial funding opportunities for community sports and active recreation organisations throughout Victoria.

This program offers an excellent opportunity for grassroots clubs to gain essential resources that boost participation, encourage safe and sustainable practices, and support the growth of inclusive, vibrant local communities.

Key Dates

  • Applications Opened: Friday, 6 September 2024
  • Applications Close: Friday, 11 October 2024 at 4pm
  • Notification of Funding Outcomes: Late December

About the Program

The Sporting Club Grants Program seeks to enable clubs to break down participation barriers, develop a skilled and supported workforce, and advance equity, diversity, and inclusivity within Victorian sports. This funding will assist clubs to:

  • Acquire uniforms and necessary safety gear.
  • Improve volunteer and coaching skills.
  • Enhance governance and management practices.
  • Increase participation among underrepresented groups.
  • Develop resilient and sustainable sporting communities.

2024-25 Funding Categories

This year’s program includes four funding categories:

  1. On-field Uniforms or Equipment
    Up to $1,000 available for playing uniforms, participation equipment, safety gear, and first-aid supplies.
  2. Volunteers and Officials
    Up to $5,000 to support projects that enhance training for volunteers, coaches, and officials, along with initiatives to retain volunteers.
  3. Access and Engagement
    Up to $1,000 for resources that improve accessibility and governance.
    Up to $4,000 for planning and delivering new or adapted sport and active recreation programs.
  4. Competitors
    Up to $750 to assist individual athletes with expenses for travel, accommodation, and event registration related to representative competitions, selection trials, or training camps.

How to Apply

Qualified organisations can submit their applications via the Grants Portal. Clubs are allowed to submit up to 10 applications across the various categories.

For further information and to access the application portal, please visit the Sporting Club Grants Program website.

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Victory unites with Roasting Warehouse in culture-led partnership

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Image credit: Melbourne Victory

The Melbourne-based anf family-owned business will join the Victory family, uniting two institutions which represent the city’s culture and identity.

A partnership with local roots

As the newest partner of Melbourne Victory, Roasting Warehouse joins forces with a vital part of the city’s sporting landscape.

The club’s Managing Director, Caroline Carnegie, outlined why the partnership bears so much value to both parties.

“We are excited to collaborate with Roasting Warehouse, a community-oriented destination for high-quality coffee, proud of its foundations in Melbourne,” said Carnegie via official media release.

“Football and coffee sit at the epicentre of Melbourne’s culture. The two go hand-in-hand, consistently at the centre of the conversation that stirs Melburnians, which is no different to the conversation sport and Melbourne Victory stir in the State.”

Indeed, this is a partnership which combines the identity, passions and culture of an entire city, therefore giving it the foundations required for long-term, mutual success.

Representing the best of Melbourne

Both Victory and Roasting Warehouse are hugely successful in their respective industries. They are institutions with community-oriented philosphies, who pride themselves on craft and quality.

“We’re incredibly proud to partner with Melbourne Victory, a club that represents the heart, passion, and ambition of Melbourne,” revealed Roasting Warehouse Head of Brand, Alexander Paraskevopoulos.

“As a Melbourne-founded, family-run business, supporting a team that means so much to the local community feels very natural for us.”

Furthermore, through their high-quality blends, Roasting Warehouse will look to prepare Victory’s players and staff for high performances on the pitch as the seasons nears completion.

But this is about far more than just fueling athletes.

This is a partnership which embodies and unites two of Melbourne’s greatest strengths and cultural markers – a connection forged from the city’s very own DNA.

 

For more information about Roasting Warehouse, click here.

Marie-Louise Eta makes history as new Union Berlin head coach

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Image credit: FC Union Berlin

In an historic appointment, Eta will take over as head coach of Union Berlin until the end of the season.

History in the making

Previously the first female assistant coach in Bundesliga history with Union Berlin, Eta will now take the reigns of the men’s first team on an interim basis.

Currently, the club sit in 11th place in the Bundesliga table, but with only two wins so far in 2026, relegation appears an all-too-real prospect, and one which the club is desperate to avoid.

“Given the points gap in the lower half of the table, our place in the Bundesliga is not yet secure,” said Eta via official media release.

‘I am delighted that the club has entrusted me with this challenging task. One of Union’s strengths has always been, and remains, the ability to pull together in such situations.”

Eta will begin as Union’s new head coach with immediate effect, and will be in the dugout for the club’s matchup against Wolfsburg this weekend.

 

A step into an equal future

Eta’s appointment signals a major step towards a more level playing field in the football landscape.

Furthermore, Eta joins other coaches including Sabrinna Wittmann, Hannah Dingley and Corinne Diacre who, in recent years, have blazed a trail for female coaches to step into the men’s game.

Wittmann currently manages FC Ingolstadt in Germany’s third division, and was the first female head coach in Germany’s top three divisions.

In 2023, Dingley became caretaker manager of Forest Green Rovers, and thus the first woman to lead a men’s professional team in England.

Diacre, now head coach of France’s women’s national team, managed Ligue 2’s Clerment Foot between 2014 and 2017.

 

Final thoughts

The impact therefore, is that Eta’s appointment will show future generations of aspiring female coaches that men’s football is an equally viable and possible pathway as the women’s game.

The time is now to level the playing field.

And while it may be a short-term role, its effect on attitudes towards equality and fair opportunities in the game will hopefully resonate long after the season ends.

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